~ The ongoing saga of turning a crumbling Italian ruin into a home

Category Archives: History

I’m super excited by a discovery I made when I was on tippy-toes trying to get a photo of the essiccatoio‘s lovely vaulted ceiling. The essiccatoio is the old, original tower, the part that doesn’t connect with the rest of the house. Its ceiling can only be seen by peering through the back window, because inside the view is obscured by a slatted floor midway up (for drying chestnuts). And what does the photo show me on the upper wall?

Evidence of a past door!

I feel like I’ve discovered a fabulous secret.

The vaulted ceiling. On the right side, there was clearly an opening that has since been sealed. Hopefully without bodies inside.

You can see from the plans, shown below, that this old tower is not currently accessible to the rest of the place. I always thought that was a shame, seeing as the ceiling is so lovely, but no-one wanted to risk smashing through a metre-thick supporting wall. Even the crazed Sledgettes know better than that!

However, it appears that over the newly discovered, sealed door there is a supporting arch and everything. I definitely want to explore the possibilities now. A book-lined den is taking shape in my head. Or a very cool dining room? or…?

The space in question.

The point of discovery! That window is just high enough that it’s not easy to see inside. At least not for those of average height.

From the front of the villa. Hope this all makes sense to you.

The old tower (the part to the left) actually has its own civic number, as though it’s a separate building. I’m sure this has implications for permits to reconnect the two but I’ll leave that battle to our erstwhile geometra Nadia. My part’s the dreaming!

Not long after buying the villa, I was up by the local church trying to get enough cellphone reception – it’s either that, or hang out the window at an alarming angle – to call our contractor. When I got through I identified myself as ‘Shelagh, the Canadian who owns the Torre’. Shelagh is a name Italians don’t remember easily, since there’s nothing like it in their language. But the crazy Canadians who had inexplicably bought a ruin in Scurtabo were unforgettable, so in the early days I always introduced myself that way.

Don Sandro, the learned priest

The church’s priest happened to be outside at that moment and overheard me. When I was finished my conversation, he approached and introduced himself. Priests are good at knowing what’s going on in their parishes, so he already knew who I was.

Don Sandro Lagomarsini, it turns out, keeps a museum of local farming and settlement history just up the road in Cassego and is a top notch historian. The museum provides a rare glimpse into a side of Italy that’s not often shown off. A far cry from the fabulous treasures of the Uffizi or Vatican, it’s a touching memoir of the unbelievable effort involved in scratching a living out of the challenging hills of Varese – without power tools.

The Museo Contadino at Cassego

Don Sandro had some interesting facts about our house: the original structure, remnants of which remain, was built as a lookout tower in 1362 – hence the house’s name through the ages of ‘torre’. It was one of three such towers built on either side of the valley by the ruling Fieschi clan in order to keep out the marauding armies of rival families.

So the view we find so tranquil was once used for popping off enemies who were trying to creep their way up the valley. We like the idea. Now we don’t just own a pile of rubble, we own a piece of history. And that makes it even more interesting.

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Godzillavilla is in the Val di Vara, an area of Liguria where you still hear few languages other than Italian, even in high tourist season. It’s not quite on the international destination map.

The little town that could

Sometime around our fifth year in Italy I’d come across an article in Io Donna, a women’s magazine, about the valley and its main town, Varese Ligure. The photos were beautiful, its story more so. Like many rural valleys that twist their way into the central spine of the Apennines, it had experienced a population exodus post-war. Young people had moved to the larger towns for work, rejecting life on the land, and the towns became phantoms of their former selves.

By the 1980’s it was a dire situation. Then Varese Ligure’s enlightened government had a brilliant idea, well ahead of its time: since their valley was in the middle of nowhere and offered pretty much nothing, why not make something of that?

Making the most of the middle of nowhere

Through a remarkable application of both will and action, in 1999 the Val di Vara became Europe’s first valley to be certified ISO 14001, the international benchmark for environmental management. Chemical free, energy-sustaining, and boasting fine organic cheeses, produce and meat, it has become an organic haven in an industrial world.

People returned to take up organic farming, bee-keeping, and cheese-making. Varese Ligure, an ancient borgo with its own perfect castle and a unique, circular town plan, began to be spruced up. Good restaurants opened. Artists and craftspeople arrived. And so did we, drawn to its energy, inventiveness, and the purity of its landscape.

Varese Ligure’s story reflects the character of its people. What better folk to be around when attempting something as audacious as bringing Godzillavilla back to life? I’m hoping some of their resolve and resourcefulness rubs off on me. If they can resurrect a whole valley and its towns, surely resurrecting one old house is possible.